Due to the Coronavirus, many of us are staying home from church. This post contains a video and activities that you can use with your kids to have a Children’s Church time as a family. Everything for this week’s lesson is focused on standing strong and uses the account of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abedgnego as the main lesson.
I hope your family is able to use this! Have a great weekend and keep standing strong for Jesus!
Opening Activities
(Choose as many of these as you want to do and do them together before watching the video)
- Find some army guys or lego minifigures and have your kids strategically set them up on a table top or other location of your choosing. Provide your kids with squirt guns or nerf guns and have them stand a certain distance away from the table. How many army guys can they shoot down? Give them a certain amount of time and see how many they get down in that time. Let everyone take a turn. Who had the best score? (If you don’t have squirt guns or nerf guns, you can use anything that they can toss at them to try to knock the items down.) When you finish this game, say: In this activity, we tried to get our army guys to fall over. We aimed at them and gave it everything we had! Do you ever feel like someone is aiming at you and trying to get you to “fall over”? Is it ever hard for you to stay strong and stand for Jesus? Today we are going to talk more about what it means to stand strong for Jesus!
- If you have Jenga, play a game of Jenga with your kids! When you finish the game, say: When we first started this game, the tower looked pretty sturdy and like it wouldn’t fall at all. However, as the game continued, the tower became less and less sturdy until it collapsed. How is this similar to us when we are facing pressure in our lives? What kinds of pressures come against us to make us not want to stand for Christ? How can we make sure we always stand for Jesus?
- Have a “pillow case” race with your kids! Get a bunch of pillow cases and have the kids stand inside them (think potato sack race). Race through the house in the pillow cases . . . you might even want to make an obstacle course for the kids to try to get through while in the pillow cases. Do this twice — once with the kids going trying it on their own, and once with a parent going along with them and helping them when they fall. When you finish this activity, discuss the difficulties of running while in the pillowcases. How is this similar to standing strong in difficult times? Say: Sometimes it can be really difficult to stay standing when pressures and difficulties come at us! However, we are not expected to stand alone! Just like one of us went along with you and helped you when you were falling, Jesus promises to always be with us. He will help us stand strong — no matter what!
The Lesson
Discussion Questions
Use these questions for further discussion after the video has aired.
- What do you think was the hardest part for Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego when they decided to take a stand?
- Did Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego know that God would protect them from the fire? (No, they did not know. For all they knew, they were really going to die — but they did the right thing anyway . . . and, when they got in the fire, they found out that Jesus was right there with them! Jesus promises to be with us in the “fires” of our life and he will help us stand strong!)
- What do the experiments with Mr. Science tell us about standing strong? (No matter what pressures come at us, Jesus can keep us from “popping” 🙂 )
- What pressures are you facing right now? How can knowing that Jesus is with you help you stand strong?
Application
- Give everyone a copy of the flame found in the pdf below. Have each person draw a picture of himself standing strong for Jesus in a situation he/she is facing right now. You might even want to encourage each person to draw a picture of Jesus beside him in the “fire” they are facing. When everyone is finished, cut the flames out, gather them together and make a “fire”. Say: It might seem like we are just one person and that our standing for Jesus won’t make much of a difference and really matter. But, look at what a great fire is created when we all stand strong for Jesus in the situations going on in our lives! Look at the light that can shine when we stand for Jesus!
- Discuss ways that your family can stand strong and be a light in the community during this time.
- Pray together!
Additional Activities
- If you are able, make a fire and roast marshmallows or make s’mores. You can also make s’mores in your house on your stove or in your microwave.
- Use any food items you have in the house to recreate the story of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. Post pictures on the Raising Godly Kids page — I’d love to see your creativity!
- Act out the story of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. Have fun!
- Have the kids build a structure out of legos (or other materials). The idea is to make the strongest structure possible. Once they have a structure built, see how much weight that structure can take before it collapses! Keep adding things to it until it breaks. Even this structure eventually collapsed under pressure but, thanks to Jesus, we WILL NOT collapse under pressure! Jesus is with us and He will help us STAND!
Here is a video you can watch together for encouragement. Sing along!
NOTE: The skit in the video and many of the activities on this page were taken from “The Call: A 10-Week Study for Families and Churches”. You can find more about this curriculum here.
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Cheri Gamble 
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